1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to integrated circuits.
2. Description of the Related Art
For various high-speed electronics applications, it is often desirable to have a circuit, which carries out its functionality, with little or no performance degradation, over a relatively wide frequency range, e.g., from dc to about 40 GHz. However, broadband microwave circuits with such characteristics are inherently difficult to design and manufacture. As a result, certain broadband circuits (e.g., tunable delay lines and variable attenuators) are still sometimes implemented using old-fashioned electro-mechanical assemblies. Disadvantageously, these electromechanical assemblies might cause a circuit to have a relatively large size, suffer from reliability problems, have a relatively low tuning speed, and/or be relatively expensive to manufacture and maintain.